Blake, Springtime, and Innocence Lost
I'm going to get this out there right out of the gate: I'm not the biggest poetry fan.
*runs and hides*
Now, despite this, I found Blake's and Wordsworth's series of poems quite profound. See, my trouble with poetry isn't the fact that I don't understand it, but rather, most of the time, I can't find context with it. These poems, on the other hand, had an interesting arc and theme to them - innocence lost. Reading all of them in succession, you get the sense that Blake was a very optimistic person, had a wonderful relationship with the Church, and loved the world's beauty. I mean, just look at how many times the man mentions springtime or evokes floral imagery. The flip side to this, though, can be found in his Experience section. I'm not exactly sure what happened, but something caused Blake's attitude to change. Suddenly, he viewed the Church as "cold," finding more solace in a local alehouse. His imagery was darker, more realistic of Victorian London, and his words were now more negative. A really cool part of this work is that it is almost like watching human life in motion; as kids we are cheerful and excited about the world, but the more we grow up, the more we realize how corrupt and bad reality can be. I'm not sure if that is what Blake's intention was here or if this drew from real-life experience, but it definitely made an impression on me.
EDIT: I commented on Will's and Zelda's posts.
*runs and hides*
Now, despite this, I found Blake's and Wordsworth's series of poems quite profound. See, my trouble with poetry isn't the fact that I don't understand it, but rather, most of the time, I can't find context with it. These poems, on the other hand, had an interesting arc and theme to them - innocence lost. Reading all of them in succession, you get the sense that Blake was a very optimistic person, had a wonderful relationship with the Church, and loved the world's beauty. I mean, just look at how many times the man mentions springtime or evokes floral imagery. The flip side to this, though, can be found in his Experience section. I'm not exactly sure what happened, but something caused Blake's attitude to change. Suddenly, he viewed the Church as "cold," finding more solace in a local alehouse. His imagery was darker, more realistic of Victorian London, and his words were now more negative. A really cool part of this work is that it is almost like watching human life in motion; as kids we are cheerful and excited about the world, but the more we grow up, the more we realize how corrupt and bad reality can be. I'm not sure if that is what Blake's intention was here or if this drew from real-life experience, but it definitely made an impression on me.
EDIT: I commented on Will's and Zelda's posts.
A beautiful picture of this is found in the contrast of Blake's "The Lamb" and "The Tiger." I totally sympathize with your feelings by the way, haha. All in all, I think you understand the trail of Blake's poems quite well. Many critics often point out the arc.
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